I was born in Alabama (Roll Tide!), but raised in a military family (Army) and so moved around a lot. After attending 12 different schools (including 3 high schools) I finally graduated from one in Anchorage, Alaska and attended college there for two years. I wasn’t very good at being a college student, and given that this was at the height of the Vietnam War, I was eventually drafted by the Army—which precipitated my enlistment in the Air Force to avoid getting shot at. Because of a little radio experience while in college, I spent the next six years as a broadcast specialist in the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service in such exotic locations as Texas, Greenland, Los Angeles, and back to Alaska.

After leaving the military (voluntarily), I continued my education at the University of Alaska, Anchorage where I received my BA in English in 1972 and my MFA in Creative Writing in 1974. (My masters thesis was in Old English literature, and if you need any Beowulf translated, I'm your man.) For several years, I worked in radio and TV, documentary film, advertising, corporate public relations, and as a graphic designer and editorial cartoonist (for which I won an Alaska Journalism Association award). Having tried everything else, I decided to be a college teacher. So, in 1980, I moved to Eugene to pursue a PhD in Telecommunications from the University of Oregon, which I received in 1982 (a two-year record that has never been beaten).

After applying for a boatload of teaching jobs, I decided on the University of Delaware (mostly because I had never been there), where I taught public relations and television production from 1982 until 1984—eventually specializing entirely in PR. I got tired of hanging those heavy studio lights from the top of a 25-foot ladder every day. Fortunately, a job in teaching PR opened up at the University of Oregon, and I jumped at the chance to return to the Northwest, or as close to Alaska as I could get.

I have been at the University of Oregon now for 30 years (geez!). During that time I have consulted for numerous clients in public relations, was a free-lance editorial cartoonist for a while (it doesn’t pay squat), drew a ton of duck cartoons for the University, learned about 100 software programs, became a digital designer (including illustration and website building), taught myself to play banjo and ukulele (although not very well), and wrote a bunch of textbooks. In 2001, I became the John L. Hulteng Chair in Media Ethics and now concentrate most of my teaching and research efforts in that area—but I still do a lot of that other stuff too.

I am the author of books on media ethics, public relations writing, publication design, advertising, and newsletter publication. I also have published a book of poetry (from a long time ago, when I was a starving poet) and several children's books (a couple of which my brother, the working artist, illustrated).